Best-Lock petitions U.S. Patent Office to cancel Lego's trademark on toy building blocks

AP Photo/The Florida Times-Union, Kelly JordanWearing a homemade lego hat, Matthew Hein, 8, right, of St. Augustine, Fla., sorts through pieces with his teammate Alex Lentz, 9, of St. Augustine, as they begin building their project as the Museum of Science & History held its third annual lego building competition in Jacksonville, Fla. Jan. 21.

Best-Lock’s move comes about a year after Lego lost a challenge in Europe over its trademark that includes the image of a small plastic block with upright cylindrical studs.

Best-Lock officials say their products have been seized by U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials based on the trademark registered by Lego in the United States.

“Best-Lock has launched a legal challenge to correct this unfair situation and restore free-market competition for all United States consumers,” Best-Lock Group Vice President Stephen Minsk says.

“Customs and Border Protection is of the opinion that this trademark somehow applies to the small cylindrical studs on Best-Lock construction toy products,” Minsk says. If the interpretation is correct, “all other construction block toy brands also infringe upon this trademark,” he adds.

“Competition in the construction block toy market will vanish, leaving the consumer in these difficult economic times without a less-expensive alternative, without a choice, without competition in a market that has been in existence for over 50 years,” Minsk says.

He alleged that Lego is desperately trying “to improperly exclude products from the marketplace and become the only choice for consumers.”

According to Minsk, Hilary Fisher Page invented the blocks, with the current shape and design, in England during the early 1940s. The plastic blocks with cylindrical studs were made by the American company Halsam and sold in the U.S. as early as the 1940s, he says.

Best-Lock Group CEO Torsten Geller adds, “To allow Lego, which was the first company to copy Mr. Page’s invention, exclusive rights on a product design that several companies have been selling in the United States for over 50 years would be outrageous and improper.”

Best-Lock has been in business for only 13 years, Geller acknowledges, but says that his company “has all the proper import permits, trademarks, and patents required by United States law.”

Geller also says that his company in 2004 won a trademark challenge against Lego in the German Supreme Court.

Michael McNally, Lego’s brand relations director at its North and South American
headquarters in Enfield, did not address Best-Lock’s allegations but said that his company is prepared to defend itself in court.

He added that Lego has taken action to protect its “considerable copyright rights in its Lego Minifigure figurines.”

In 2010 the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg ruled that the Lego’s trademark red brick image is not the company’s to use exclusively and can be used by its competitors in the EU.

Lego, based in Denmark, had petitioned the court to register the eight-stud brick as a trademark, which would have precluded competitors from placing the image on boxes containing non-Lego-made toy bricks. But the EU court ruled that the image is of a “functional” plastic brick, the appearance of which “is bound to be the same no matter the manufacturer.”